Coastal birds

["Steve Holliday" <>]

Hi Julian

 

The Double-banded Plover is an interesting one. A complete pale hindneck collar is often (always??) present in young birds, and to a varying extent in non-breeding adults, however you wouldn't be able to tell this from most of our field guides. Plates in Slaters, Simpson & Day and Morcombe don't show it, Pizzey does but doesn't discuss it in the text. I should add that all my field guides are old editions, maybe the newer ones have improved on this. HANZAB is more helpful if you have access to it, as is the recently published 'Shorebirds of Australia' by Andrew Geering et al. I'm not sure but this may be a youngish bird moulting into adult breeding plumage for the first time, even so I think the collar is unusually prominent. Normally it is a buffy colour rather than white.

 

cheers

 

Steve